Posted: 24th Apr, 2003 By: MarkJ
Concerns are growing that the telecoms regulator,
Oftel, could hold up the introduction of BTs recently announced broadband ADSL price cuts:
Sources have told The Register that Oftel is mulling the idea while it carries out a full investigation into complaints that the cost cut is "anti-competitive".
The price drop announced earlier this month only applied to BT's 'IPStream' service - the wholesale end-to-end service provided by BT Wholesale to the telco's retail operations and other service providers.
However, Energis, Thus and Tiscali all complained to the regulator incensed that BT failed to pass on similar price cuts to its wholesale Datastream service - a product that allows other service providers to use their own networks to provide competitive broadband services.Oftel has held up the introduction of unrelated price cuts before; however, with many ISPs already offering the discounts, such a delay could cause damage.
It remains to be seen whether
Oftel intends to pursue such action, although they're not ruling anything out. More @
The Register.